Classified Docs Case: Donald Trump Faces More Charges in Mar-a-Lago Probe

Jack Smith brings additional charges against Donald Trump in classified documents case.

Classified Docs Case: Donald Trump Faces More Charges in Mar-a-Lago Probe
Special Counsel Jack Smith brings additional charges to former United States Donald Trump in relation to the classified documents case as well as bringing a second aide to the controversy. MANDEL NGAN / AFP) (MANDEL NGAN/AFP via Getty Images

Special Counsel Jack Smith brought more charges against former United States President Donald Trump in relation to the classified documents case.

The new development shows that federal prosecutors are now alleging that the Republican businessman, as well as a newly-charged aide, of trying to keep investigators from gaining access to security camera footage to keep them from reviewing the videos.

Donald Trump Faces New Charges

The former president is now also facing a fresh charge on top of the 37 counts that he is already facing in the case, which is illegally retaining national defense information. The indictment charges were filed against the Republican and two aides, identified as Walter "Walt" Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira.

The charges requested that another Trump employee allegedly deleted security camera footage at the Mar-a-Lago Club in an attempt to prevent the videos from being given over to a federal grand jury.

Oliveira is the second Trump aide that was hit with charges in relation to the classified documents case. Nauta was indicted alongside Trump earlier in June and is accused of assisting the Republican businessman in misleading investigators as they worked to retrieve all of the documents in question, as per the Washington Post.

People who are familiar with the investigation said that investigators under Smith repeatedly pressed Oliveira to explain his actions from June 2022. These were when he helped Nauta move several boxes around the former president's home, and in July 2022 when he supposedly talked with others about security camera footage.

The sources, who spoke under the condition of anonymity due to the talks being about secret grand jury proceedings, said that investigators became increasingly skeptical of the second aide's answers as they continued their probe.

A spokesman for Trump, Steven Cheung, called the charges against his client that were revealed on Thursday a "continued desperate and flailing attempt" to harass the Republican businessman. He said that the situation comes as the former president is seeking the GOP nomination for the White House.

Classified Documents Case

The indictment claims that the second aide charged in the classified documents case told the director of IT at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort that, "the boss" wanted to have the servers deleted. The new charges against the former president relate to top-secret documents about potential Iran attack plans, according to CNN.

Trump is known to have discussed such plans with biographers during a taped meeting at Bedminster, New Jersey, in July 2021, the indictment said. It adds that the document was a presentation that concerned military activity within a foreign nation. The indictment also noted that the former president showed it to the biographers during his meeting with them.

The case revolves around Trump allegedly storing hundreds of government documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate after leaving the White House and trying to keep them hidden from federal agents who tried to retrieve the sensitive materials.

Both Trump and his aide, Nauta, have pleaded not guilty in the case and a trial has been scheduled for May 2025. John Irving, a lawyer for the second aide, declined to comment on the situation for now, said CNBC.

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